


Touch

by allthatconfetti



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: M/M, childhood friends AU told in vignettes, past soonseok, small sidepair mingsol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-10
Updated: 2016-12-10
Packaged: 2018-09-07 16:08:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8807395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/allthatconfetti/pseuds/allthatconfetti
Summary: "We're put together beautifully, nothing can touch us, my love."Seungkwan meets Seokmin, and grows up with him.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ironcouer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ironcouer/gifts).



> The summary is made of smushed-up The National lyrics from "All the Wine".
> 
> Seokkwan is actually one of my top tier pairs, and I've been writing this for awhile now. Nearly a year. I'm sorry it's taken so long to publish but I got stuck at one part because writing it made me really emotional. And so. My apologies.
> 
> Thank you ao3 user aishiteita for the look-through. I'm love you my bub <3
> 
> This is for Blake, whom I love a lot. Please don't give up on your babies, for their love for each other is pure and unabashed. <3 Thank you for putting up with me all the time, and letting me whine at you. I hope you like this, as every word of this was written with you in mind. I'm sorry you had to wait for this for a long time. I really love you! Sending you lovely thoughts <3

_i. toes_

It’s July and the sun is hot. Seungkwan frowns and shakes his head, trying to ignore how the sweat makes the shirt stick to his back and how the heat makes sharp little jabs at his nape. The sound of his mother’s voice murmurs in his head, reminding him to pack an extra towel. He’s forgotten, naturally.

Absentmindedly, he wipes at his brow and kicks at the stones that line up the path. Car horns honk somewhere in the distance but he’s old enough to go to the neighborhood playground in the park on his own. He’s almost eleven, after all.

Summer usually means afternoons at the pool and running around with his cousins playing tag in one of their backyards but his best friend is visiting family in Florida and his cousins and sisters all have plans. His mother cleans the house while Korean news programs that remind her of home buzz in the background, so he announces, in an outdoor voice that has her frowning, that he’s going to the park in the hopes that something there will keep his attention. She tells him to be back in an hour.

He hums a pop song his oldest sister was singing in her room the other day and makes a beeline for the swings as soon as he enters the little fenced in area of the park that makes the playground, hardly believing his luck. Other than two girls in the sandbox and another boy sitting two spots away from him on the swings, the playground is empty. Seungkwan glances at the other boy on the swings before digging his heels into the dirt and pushing himself backwards. His legs are thin and not very long, so when he stands on tiptoe and then sits back, feet flailing, he doesn’t get very far. Undaunted, he stands back to try again, wiggling a little to go higher.

“Hi!" 

Seungkwan looks back to see the boy from the other swing behind him. He’s probably a little older than him, wearing yellow and the biggest smile Seungkwan has ever seen on a human being.

“Do you want me to push you?”

Seungkwan narrows his eyes a little and ignores him. He can do this on his own, thank you very much. He doesn’t need anyone’s help. Besides, his mom told him never to talk to strangers.

After a sufficiently awkward length of time, Seungkwan notices that the boy leaves and returns to his swing. He sneaks a look over and sees that the boy’s smile has dimmed a little. Seungkwan’s brows furrow. He hopes that wasn’t his doing, but it probably was. That sucks. He’s not a bad person. He doesn’t want to make the boy sad; he just doesn’t want to be helped.

Seungkwan hesitates, before calling out. “What’s your name?”

The boy looks up, surprised. “What?”

Seungkwan rolls his eyes a little. “I can’t talk to people who are strangers so… you have to tell me your name.”

The boy’s eyes light up when he catches on. “Oh! My name is Seokmin.”

“I’m Seungkwan.”

The boy--Seokmin--stands up, stops in front of him. He’s smiling again, and Seungkwan thinks he prefers it that way. “We just moved here last week. My mom thinks I should get more sunlight but it’s really hot.”

Seungkwan nods sagely. “It gets even hotter in August.”

Seokmin gestures at Seungkwan. “Do you want me to push you?” Seungkwan makes a face as he thinks about it, and decides he’s tired of the swings. He shakes his head, gets up, and almost immediately stumbles. His ears turn red with embarrassment when Seokmin steps forward and steadies him. He’s only known Seokmin for two minutes and he’s already being clumsy around him.

“I think your shoelace is untied.” Before Seungkwan can even look down, Seokmin is kneeling and tying it for him. His tongue sticks out in concentration as he untangles the knots in the shoelace. Seungkwan wants the ground to open him up and swallow him whole, preferably right now.

“You don’t have to do that, Seokmin, really.”

Seokmin ties a neat bow and tugs tightly to secure the laces. He looks up into Seungkwan’s face, smiles that big bright smile. “It’s nothing. Friends do that for friends.”

At this, Seungkwan scoffs a little. “You’ve only known me for a few minutes.”

Seokmin shrugs. “I know, but it’s not a big deal.” He gets up, dusting off the grass from the knees of his jeans. “Also, with some people you can just tell.”

Seungkwan tilts his head. “Has anyone ever told you you’re kind of weird?”

The other boy laughs, and Seungkwan’s ears quirk at the sound of it. It sounds like how a Snickers bar tastes - warm, sweet and a little nutty. “Maybe.”

Seungkwan smiles. He could deal with weird. “Okay, maybe I do want someone to push.”

The other boy laughs. “Okay, we can take turns. You go first.” They don’t even notice when Seungkwan’s hour is up.

 

_ii. knees_

The night before his first day of freshman year, Seungkwan feels sick. He’s bunched up in the corner of his room, on his bed, and he wants to throw up. He’s afraid - of what, he’s not quite sure of yet. He keeps picturing long hallways and lockers that stretched out endlessly, and the nameless faces of people who would think he was too loud or too round or too everything.

The door knob opens, and he’s about to whine at his sister for coming in without knocking when he sees Seokmin. In his house that’s almost like his own, Seokmin doesn’t need to knock.

“How did you do this?” Seungkwan asks him weakly.

Seokmin laughs. “It’s not as bad as you think it is.” He’s a sophomore this year, and it’s the thought that he’ll be by Seungkwan’s side when he walks into the building as a student for the first time (he’s been there before to see his sisters in plays and that one time his mom brought him along to pick them up from detention) that gets him through the last few days. He sits on Seungkwan’s bed, his long and getting longer legs folded underneath him. He nudges Seungkwan, makes him face him.

“Sit up, will you?”

“I feel like dying. _”_

“You’ll be fine. There’s no one there you haven’t seen before.”

Seungkwan grumbles and finally relents, sitting up and pulling his blanket around him like a cloak. His shoulders bump into Seokmin’s, his presence easing his nerves better than the wool around him. “That’s easy for you to say. Everyone loves you.”

Seokmin laughs, a starburst of sound. “That’s not true. And it doesn’t matter. You just need the people you trust around you. I mean, Vernon’s going to be there with you right?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Seungkwan mumbles. He fiddles with a loose yarn from his blanket. “And you’ll be there too, right?”

Seokmin smiles, reaches out and places his hand on top of Seungkwan’s knee. “Seungkwan Boo, you couldn’t get rid of me if you tried.”

On any other day Seungkwan would roll his eyes, maybe try to push him off the bed while Seokmin erupts into peals of loud obnoxious laughter but the hand on his knee is warm and firm and Seungkwan feels a little like crying.

“I don’t want people to hate me,” he whispers, his eyes lowered in confession.

“Hey,” Seokmin says, the hand on Seungkwan’s knee patting him reassuringly. “Look at me.”

Seungkwan does, and he sees the face that’s been in and out of his house since he was a kid playing on a swing and tripping over his own two feet. It’s sweet and warm and familiar, especially when his eyes are curved into small crescents when he smiles that smile that a tiny part of Seugkwan believes he stole from the sun. Seokmin isn’t his best friend - that’s Vernon - but he is probably the only person in Seungkwan’s life who understands him better than he understands himself.

(Seungkwan has always wondered what that person was called.)

Seokmin is bright and loud and irresistible (even Seungkwan’s sisters are fond of him) but there are times, like right now, when he’s capable of so much softness that it takes Seungkwan aback a little.

“If they get to know you like I know you,” Seokmin says, the expression on his face unreadable. “There’s no doubt in my mind that they will love you.”

When Seungkwan goes to sleep that night, stomach marginally less unsettled as it has been all week, the expression on Seokmin’s face is the last thing he thinks about.

 

_iii. hips_

Late October brings in unusual weather, and Seungkwan’s mood plummets as a result. It’s not as if he isn’t busy enough, what with the auditions for the winter play starting and most of his classes requiring midterm reports already. Now he has to deal with mornings where he has to shove his arms into a plastic blue raincoat that had to cover his already overstuffed backpack (his mom cringes every time he accidentally bangs the bag against the screen door) and navigate through the muddy puddles lining up his usual route to and from the bus stop.

“Bye mom!” he calls out. The screen door clangs when his bag hits the screen as he’s slipping his feet into trainers by the welcome mat. He only has three minutes to catch the bus to school.

He takes the shortcut behind the Millers’ yard, touching his right palm against the old oak tree in the empty lot behind his neighbors’ doghouse. He looks past the trunk and sees the small group of kids he’s grown up with loosely huddled around the bus stop sign - Meg and Todd from two doors down, Joaquin from down the street, Charlie from a couple of blocks away, and Seokmin. Always Seokmin. Seungkwan doesn’t remember a day when he’s gone to school without him, except that time when Seokmin got ear surgery. Seungkwan’d had to sit next to Todd for a week while Seokmin was recovering, and Todd tried to talk to him about comic books for five minutes before giving up and spending the rest of the week’s rides to school in silence.

“Hey,” Seungkwan says, as he walks up to Seokmin. He’s made it with about a minute to spare. Seokmin looks up at his voice and smiles, closes the book he’s been reading (“Advanced Algebra and Calculus”, the cover reads).

“Did you get to finish your report?” Seokmin asks, absentmindedly flattening the collar of Seungkwan’s windbreaker. Seungkwan lets him but makes a face.

“Remind me to do better at Mr. Kohlschreiber’s pop quizzes so that I don’t have to keep having to pass stuff for extra credit.”

Seokmin shrugs. He’d had Kohlschreiber for Econ last year and did relatively well. “You know I told you he always gives them every four weeks or after our basketball team loses a big game. Figure it out.” He says it with a smile though, his eyes sympathetic.

A car passes by and drives right through a puddle in the middle of the street. The movement makes rain water spray in a grimy arc through the air, and Seungkwan feels Seokmin’s hand on his hip pulling him close.

“Ewww,” Seungkwan hears Meg complain, puddle water landing somewhere in her bleached blonde hair. Joaquin frowns at the wet brown spots on his new basketball shoes, and everyone else takes a collective step away from the street.

Seokmin doesn’t let go though, gripping Seungkwan’s hip firmly and keeping him firmly lodged at his side. Seungkwan’s arm is stuck, pressed awkwardly between them, and he’d have shoved Seokmin away if his stomach didn’t start doing the weird twisting thing that it’s been doing lately whenever Seokmin was around.

(Seungkwan doesn’t want to think about it; thinking about it is weird. It’s made homework with him and Vernon every other afternoon really uncomfortable, especially when in the middle of equations and formulas he notices how dark Seokmin’s lashes look against his cheeks and how the bridge of his glasses sits against his nose.

He kind of hates himself.)

“They really need to fix those holes in the road,” Seokmin comments. He’s peering after the car that drove by, lips turned slightly. Seungkwan clears his throat and tries to ease out of his grip. Now is really not the time to notice the way he fits under Seokmin’s arm.

The familiar sound of a wheezing engine and creaking wheels gives Seungkwan the opportunity he’s looking for. “Bus is here,” he announces to the others, stumbling in his attempt to clamber as quickly as he can onto the vehicle.

Vernon’s sitting in his usual spot near the end of the bus, head bent over a sketch book, dusty brown bangs held away from his eyes with a thin pink headband. Seungkwan sinks into the seat next to him, physically restraining himself from breathing a sigh of relief.

Vernon looks up, sees Seungkwan’s expression. Sees Seungkwan. “Hey. You okay?” He’s a little confused. Understandable. He and Vernon usually sit together on the way home, not on the way to school since Vernon’s mom takes him there most of the time. Seungkwan usually sits next to Seokmin going to school.

Seungkwan watches as Seokmin’s eyes flash quickly in his direction before he sits next to Minghao, a Chinese junior Seungkwan remembers he’s good friends with. Seungkwan purses his lips, shakes his head a little.

“Fine, I’m fine,” Seungkwan replies. “Talk to me about biology homework.” Or anything, really. Anything else.

He needs the distraction.

 

_iv. shoulders_

The Lee house is three streets away from his own. It’s a neat brown two-storey with a blue roof and shutters, but not the kind of brown that’s bland or boring. It’s a deep kind of brown that’s always reminded Seungkwan of those earthy pots his mom made kimchi in. The windows would always be open because Mrs. Lee liked hearing the sounds of kids playing in other yards. Even when the kids in the neighborhood had grown up and in, preferring iPads and Playstations to bicycles and seesaws, Mrs. Lee kept the windows open.

At night, the windows would glow from the warm yellow lights of their living room, where Seokmin and his sister would be play-fighting and singing whatever came to mind at the top of their lungs. Sometimes, when their cousin Jihoon was over, the Lees would gather around him and persuade him to play some One Republic instead of the usual Chopin he had to practice day in and day out.

Those evenings were some of the best memories Seungkwan had of growing up: pretending to get drunk over cider and yelling with laughter and singing songs and being by Seokmin’s side.

It’s tough to think that he won’t be having that for four years.

If he was being completely honest with himself he hasn’t had that for awhile now. Seokmin’s sister went to state university three years ago and Seokmin was following her there. Seungkwan knows he got into the music program, that he’d be starting in a week, and that he would be staying at the dorms on campus (and even that information was filtered through his mom, who got it from Seokmin’s mom as soon as they heard from the school.)

Seungkwan doesn’t like to think about how his friendship with Seokmin has gotten to a point where he didn’t even know what program he was going to for college. Dwelling on it for too long makes his throat itch. Things change, shit happens. That’s what he tells himself anyway.

Sometime in his sophomore year, Seungkwan gets busy. Too busy for morning bus rides, afternoon homework sessions and evening singalongs. His less-than-stellar academics (by his mother’s standards, at least) has him volunteering to be his biology teacher’s assistant, so he has to go to school earlier than most. There’s drama club and council activities in the afternoon and by the time he gets home, he only has time for dinner, homework, and scrolling through his social media apps in bed until he falls asleep.

He finds out Seokmin is going out with a senior named Soonyoung one midnight tucked under his covers when a picture of the two of them is posted on Seokmin’s Snapchat. The photo disappears in a blink of an eye but Seungkwan remembers Seokmin and the other boy he remembers from joint arts recitals making bunny ears behind each other’s heads, cheeks pressed together.

The caption says something about a date after dance club practice. Seungkwan deletes Snapchat five minutes later.

Vernon thinks Seungkwan is using school activities to distract himself from his annoyance at Seokmin not telling him about dating someone. “You’ve been friends for so long. If you really cared about the guy, you’d make time to spend with him,” he says one morning at Seungkwan’s locker, twirling his iPhone around his fingers.

“Like you’re making time for me?”

Seungkwan’s sarcasm is thinly veiled, but it goes over Vernon’s head completely. He smiles his usual big gummy smile, nodding enthusiastically. “Exactly.”

Seungkwan refuses to accept advice from someone in a very happy relationship. Vernon and Minghao (Seokmin’s Minghao - he and Vernon had started sitting together on the bus when Seungkwan stopped riding the bus and things happened quickly) are adorable; almost disgustingly so. It’s not that Seungkwan takes Vernon’s happiness against him - on the contrary he was delighted when Vernon told him they were dating because honestly only Minghao had the eternal patience to deal with Vernon on a daily basis - but every time they were all together and Minghao did things like flick Vernon’s forehead whenever he said something dumb (all the time), Seungkwan would remember the feeling of a hand stroking his hair, a warmth pressing against his side, a smile that encouraged him whenever he was feeling hopeless about math or getting a bit role in the play. And it sucked. It sucked to remember what he had and it sucked equally as bad to be reminded about what he doesn’t have anymore.

Because Vernon’s wrong - it’s not about him being annoyed or missing Seokmin because they’re spending less time together. Spending less time with Seokmin is simply the unfortunate side effect of Seungkwan realizing that he liked him.

(Seungkwan thinks, rather naively, that maybe the feeling of butterflies in his stomach at the thought of the other boy would go away with limited interaction. So he throws himself into his extracurriculars and academic projects. He restricts replies to Seokmin’s texts asking how he is to hours-late one liners until eventually those taper away. Whenever Seokmin tries to corner him in the hallway on his way to class, he side steps with muttered apologies and excuses until eventually they just end up nodding at each other.

He ignores the hurt he catches in Seokmin’s eyes whenever Seungkwan looks away first, and he ignores the hurt he feels in his own chest when Seokmin stops bothering. Even when he hears that he and Soonyoung call it quits, he fears that his actions have created a chasm too wide to repair. He fears Seokmin won’t want to.)

But it’s a quarter to nine on a warm June evening, the night before Seokmin leaves for state university. It’s a whole three hour drive away, the farthest Seokmin has ever been from Seungkwan since they’ve met, and despite everything, Seungkwan thinks he owes it to the little boy who tied his shoelace in the park to at least say goodbye.

The house is quiet when he trudges up the well-worn path to the Lee front door, carrying a cake his mom baked today. The lights in the windows are dimmed and Seungkwan stupidly thinks maybe he’d already gone. He rings the doorbell once, twice, fidgets. Silence.

He turns around and backtracks a few steps to see if the car is in the garage when he hears the door open. It’s almost comical how he almost drops the cake at the sound.

“Seungkwan?”

He lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “Mrs. Lee!”

Seokmin’s mom is standing in the frame, dishrag slung over one arm, hair in a messy twist. She sees the box in his hands, and her face melts into a familiar smile. Seokmin’s smile. “I’m afraid you’ve missed dinner.”

“It’s okay, I’ve eaten.” (He hasn’t.) He smiles sheepishly, hands her the box. “Mom sent me over with dessert.”

Mrs. Lee laughs. “I’ll never say no to her chocolate cake.” She tilts her head and looks at him not unkindly. Seungkwan wants to shuffle his feet. Mothers always see things you don’t want them to see.

“Are you here to see Seokmin?” It’s been awhile, remains unsaid between them.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I’ll let him know you’re here. Would you like to come inside?”

“If it’s alright, I’d rather wait out here.” A quick goodbye is all he’s here for, after all.

Mrs. Lee hums, studies him thoughtfully for a beat longer than comfortable. “I’ll let him know you’re here.” She smiles at him. “It’s nice to see you again Seungkwan,” she says, before shutting the door.

It’s barely two minutes later (eighty five seconds, not that he counted) when the door opens again, and Seokmin is there.

His hair is longer, is the first thing he notices. It hits Seungkwan suddenly, the number of months that’s gone by without hearing the other’s laugh, without seeing the other’s face. Seokmin isn’t in high school anymore; he’s going to college. He’s taller than Seungkwan remembers now, and in the basketball jersey he’s wearing his arms look sturdier.

He looks more than a little puzzled that it’s Seungkwan at the door. “Seungkwan?” It’s an echo of his mother’s confusion earlier.

Seungkwan opens his mouth, and words trip on their way out. “Huck--,” he stammers, clears his throat. His cheeks feel like they’re on fire. “Hey.”

\---

It’s a five minute walk to the old playground, and a total of three feet of space between them. The park is closed but they’re tall enough to jump over the fence. Or Seokmin is, anyway. Seungkwan’s foot catches on the edge of a picket, and Seokmin looks like he’s about to reach out to steady him, but Seungkwan jogs off the stumble, cheeks pink. It’s a terrible case of deja vu.

Because God apparently wants to make a mockery of him and his feelings, Seokmin wanders over to the swings. He’s wearing the first sweater he grabbed from the hook from his house; it doesn’t match the sweatpants he’s wearing at all. Seungkwan watches as he reaches out to grip the chains, jiggling and tugging at them a little to test their weight. 

“Hey Seungkwan,” he says, so softly that Seungkwan thinks he might be imagining it.

There’s a lump in Seungkwan’s throat. “Yeah?”

Seokmin looks over his shoulder, tilting his head almost shyly, and asks, “Do you want me to push?”

Nostalgia hits Seungkwan so hard that it makes a laugh splutter out of him. The tears follow soon after.

“Hey, hey. Seungkwan. Don’t do that.” Arms encircle his shoulders, and the familiarity of the warmth that could only belong to Seokmin returning after years, really makes Seungkwan lose it.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Seokmin reassures him. Seungkwan has his face buried in his hands, but he still feels Seokmin bring a hand up to his hair, soft reassuring strokes. He’s much more solid now, much taller too, and how he feels around Seungkwan, against Seungkwan, is something he’s not used to yet.

“You can’t say it’s okay when you don’t know why I’m sorry, dummy,” Seungkwan grouses, and Seokmin smiles. If Seungkwan squints just a little, he can see the corners of his eyes looking a little bright.

“I’ll accept any apology coming from you.”

“Why are you so good to me, Seok? It’s really annoying,” Seungkwan says, a whine coming over his tone. He lowers his head again, conversing with the ground like his life depended on it. “I’ve been a terrible friend and now, now you’re leaving and I’m here, cleaning the slate at the last minute, and you should be angry, you should hate me. I’m horrible.”

“Hey, hey,” Seokmin interrupts his monologue with a little shake. His hands are firm at his shoulders; Seungkwan feels the press of his fingers keenly against his back. “Look at me.”

Seungkwan doesn’t want to. He won’t be able to maintain his tenuous grasp on composure the minute he lifts his head again to meet Seokmin’s kind gaze.

His chin is lifted, gently, Seokmin’s fingers cupping his jaw. Seungkwan has to look up so much, Seokmin is so tall but he’s smiling so sweetly. He doesn’t even notice that his hands are clutching at the other’s sweater, trying not to fall.

“I told you before. With some people, you just know.”

Seungkwan’s missed this. Seungkwan’s missed him. The lies he’s told himself over the years unravel one by one, until he remembers what got him into this situation in the first place: butterflies in his stomach, leaning into Seokmin’s warmth, the number of creases he gets on his face whenever he smiles.

Carefully, he wraps his arms around Seokmin’s waist, buries his face into his neck. His tears are probably dampening the collar of his sweater but he’ll apologize for them later, among other things. For now, there is just this.

“I missed you.”

“I missed you too.”

 

_v. lips_

The smile that greets Seungkwan when the door opens is blinding.

“You’re here!”

Seungkwan rolls his eyes, but he can’t help the smile that creeps onto his face. “Reign it in a little, Seok.”

Seokmin throws arms around him, dragging him into his room. “Why didn’t you tell me you were here already? I would have helped you look for your dorm and everything.”

“It’s not like I haven’t been here before,” Seungkwan reminds him. “I made the drive up here for every single one of your concerts.”

“You talk like there was more than two of them,” Seokmin teases him. He draws away, hands framing Seungkwan’s face; he beams at him. Seungkwan can’t help but smile back. “You’re really here.”

“I really am.”

“Is your mom still here?”

“She’s downstairs,” Seungkwan shrugs. “She told me to come get you and we can go out for lunch.”  
  
“Awesome! I’ll get my coat.” But he’s still standing there, holding Seungkwan’s face, and smiling down at him.

Seungkwan pinks under his attention. “You can stop now.” He pokes Seokmin in the stomach, making the other double over into him. His hands reach out, grasp at his, and their fingers link, naturally. Like they always do.

“Sorry, I was basking. You’re finally here.”

“I am. You can stop being soppy during our Skype dates now.”

“Sure, but first.” Seokmin steps in and Seungkwan anticipates this, has time for a short inhale before Seokmin’s kissing him and everything inside him lights up. He’s still not used to this--being able to kiss Seokmin, having Seokmin feel exactly the same way he feels about him, and being held like this, close and tight, like he’s someone’s whole world. But he has time. They have time.

Seungkwan pulls away. “You know, much as I missed you, and as much as I want to continue this, my mother is literally waiting for us in the car downstairs.” He’s feeling a little light-headed, but he’s trying his best not to let Seokmin notice.

Seokmin sees right through him, though, and he smiles. He holds his hand out, and Seungkwan takes it. “It’s really nice of your mom to take your boyfriend out to lunch.”

Seungkwan rolls his eyes, but they walk together down his dorm hallway companionably. “She and your mom worry about you not eating well enough. And by association, she’s worried I won’t be eating well enough. You need to tell her I’ll be fine, otherwise she’ll be coming up here every weekend.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.” Seokmin looks down, nudges him playfully.

“Yeah but I’m in college now. I can’t have my mom around.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll tell her I’ll take care of you. She trusts me.”

Seungkwan snorts. “You think you have us Boos all figured out?”

Seokmin tugs him closer, holds his hand tighter. “I wouldn’t dream of it. You are a constant enigma.” He beams at him again and Seungkwan’s never felt more assured about his place in life. His first day is in a few days, but he feels much calmer than his first day of high school. Maybe because Seokmin is by his side. But he’s not going to tell him that.

Maybe later.


End file.
